This Collection of his Writings and Photographs is a Memorial to the Life and Work of Murdoch MacKenzie

KIRKSPIRE MAY 2006

THE RIBER MEMORIAL DAY CARE CENTRE 1THE ORIGINS

Murdoch MacKenzie When Bishop Newbigin asked me in 1971 if I would go to St Andrew’s Church as Presbyter he said: ‘I would like you to involve the people there in the kind of things you have been doing already in Madras.’ Having been ordained in St George’s Cathedral on 30th April 1967 I worked as a junior Presbyter in Vyasarpady, Venkatesapuram and Korukkupet – otherwise known as the VVK Unit. My senior Presbyter was Rev V Nesarathnam of Harwood Raw Memorial Church and I had the privilege of working alongside Rev S Aruldoss (then a Deacon), Rev P Singaram and Rev John Moses. They were all very patient with me and I learned so much from each of them. The Unit (it wasn’t a Pastorate then) was in a very poor area of the city and with the advent of the DMK, various hoodlums set fire to hutment areas one of which was Jothi Venkatachalam Nagar, right opposite St Peter’s Church in Vyasarpady. I had just conducted a wedding there early that morning, saw the first hut ablaze, called the fire brigade, but within minutes the whole colony was reduced to ashes. Then began a nine month period when, with the help of CASA, we housed many families in a large pandal and gradually worked beside them, and beside Fr Schlooz of the Beatitudes Centre, in rebuilding their homes. I had also been responsible, with Mr Balasingh, for the building of 30 new sanitation units in hutment areas across north Madras. The Chief Minister, Thiru Karunanidhi, estimated that the government could clear the 700 hutment areas in Madras city at the rate of 100 a year and stated that by 1977 there would be no slums left in the city. Thus began the Slum Clearance Board with its motto: ‘God we shall see in the smile of the poor’ and at the same time Rev (later Bishop) Azariah and I, together with Mrs Viji Srinivasan, and other citizens of Madras, initiated ‘The Seventy Seven Society’. In much of this work I was inspired and encouraged by my good friend Stephen Michael who at that time was a fully qualified Social Worker. Stephen has been for many years a Presbyter in our Diocese but at present is quite ill and living in Ayanavaram. Please keep his wife and himself in your prayers. On my arrival at the Kirk and with Bishop Newbigin’s words ringing in my ears it seemed only natural that I should seek assistance from Michael. He it was who conducted a survey of the felt and unfelt needs of our neighbours living in the huts alongside the compound wall and helped us to listen carefully to them. Among his main recommendations were their need for water, for employment and linked to this their need for a day care centre for their pre-school age children and older children who had not yet gone to school. The Kirk Session debated long and hard about all of this (there were only six elders at the time!) and some said that if you gave these people a tap with running water they would simply steal it. They never did and the tap was there for years beside the old tennis courts. In the March 1973 Kirkspire in the ‘Random Notes’ a short report read as follows:DAY CARE CENTRE has now begun in earnest. At present we are preparing 20 children between the ages of 5 and 7 to go to a proper school starting in June. The children are being initiated into a routine-based way of life, with formal teaching, free play and games. They are also receiving food. Volunteers could be a great help. Why not come along any day Monday to Friday?This was the first of many references to the Day Care Centre to appear in the Kirkspire over the past 33 years. We will continue the story next month.Murdoch MacKenzie